


Come Back To Me

by agnes_writes



Category: The Folk of the Air - Holly Black
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Death, F/M, Headcanon, Heavy Angst, I'm Sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 05:56:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28523565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agnes_writes/pseuds/agnes_writes
Summary: Age is a foreign concept in Elfhame.But it isn't for the first human queen.
Relationships: Jude Duarte/Cardan Greenbriar
Comments: 3
Kudos: 69





	Come Back To Me

**Author's Note:**

> I saw this headcanon on Twitter and I like pain, so I'm sorry.

Age is a foreign concept to Elfhame.

Cardan had always seen time as the coming and going of seasons and nothing more, from the crunch of the leaves that came in shades of red and brown to the cold wind biting through his garments. Of course, as High King, he could control the weather as he pleases, but he found a strange comfort in letting nature take its course in Elfhame.

Now he sees time in the way Jude blooms with life.

He sees it in the way smile lines slowly etch on the side of her lips, or the way sees stray streaks of silver cut through her warm brown hair. He feels it in the way her hands dry and coat with wrinkles and the way she cuts down her training hours because her body could only take so much exertion.

She tries to hide it from him, he knows, and he does his best to humor her. Not for his sake, but for hers. Cardan knows that Jude hated being reminded of just how unlike them she is, how “weak” and utterly _human_ she is compared to the faerie folk around her.

And so he ignores it, ignores how she pauses to take a breath when she has to climb too many steps up the palace, or how she seems to forget things more easily than she did a few years back. But Cardan smiles at her, ever so patiently, brushes her hair back and tries again.

In his heart, Cardan knew Jude isn't staying forever, though how he wished she was.

Still, he didn't know just how empty it would feel.

The last day was the hardest.

He had resolved himself not to shed tears while around her, but that resolve crumbled when he gave him a final smile, and she brushed them away with her hand.

“I love you,” she whispered to him, her own breath almost failing her.

Then she closed her eyes and did not open them again.

Dark clouds covered the skies and a scream of pure sorrow echoed through Elfhame that night, and its citizens knew that their Queen was gone.

Cardan could barely get up for the funeral. To him, it was a blur of insulting, thinly veiled condolences and white tapestries. He did not believe that any of the Fair Folk had shed a single sincere tear for his wife, after opposing her so adamantly. Death is not something they understood, and it made them all the more disgusting to him.

He wanted to get angry, to throw everyone who ever made a scathing remark about her into the dungeons, to hurt them for ever daring to hurt her—

But none of that would ever bring her back.

And so he stands, stoic and silent, they bury her the way humans were.

He stays long after everyone leaves, and then he starts to talk to Jude.

As if she were still there.

And he continues to go back every single day, damn whatever his subjects say about him.

First, he looked at time through the changing of the seasons. Then, he saw time through the lens of his mortal wife, and he realizes just how short it is compared to them. He wonders whether living forever truly is the blessing the Folk say it is, because it certainly did not feel like it.

Now, as he sits on his throne as High King, he thinks of time and begins to count. He counts his years through his memories of Jude, of how she smirks or curls her lips at him, of how she always managed to leave him speechless with awe, of how her lips felt on his, of how warm her embrace is in the coldest of nights. Strong, fiery, feisty Jude. His beautiful wife.

One day without Jude by his side.

Soon, it will turn into two. Three. A month. A year. A century.

And yet, Cardan will still keep counting.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on Twitter! @agneswrites_
> 
> As usual, tell me what you think, all reactions and criticisms are very much so welcome! Thank you for reading ❤️


End file.
